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"Quantacat's name is still recognised even if he watches on with detached eyes like Peter Molyneux over a cube in 3D space, staring at it with tears in his eyes, softly whispering... Someday they'll get it." - The Conclave

Yeah I've read that and the Hexus review too - they basically pitch it as a good card for £180/220EU/220$ but it's less than 2/3rds that price which is why I'm thinking "erm....."

Given that a 650TI is the big-end of £100 - £110 for that is astonishing value but there MUST be a snag (other than it not fitting - I mean I could buy a new case with the change from a 7850 which it's MUCH better than!?)

"Quantacat's name is still recognised even if he watches on with detached eyes like Peter Molyneux over a cube in 3D space, staring at it with tears in his eyes, softly whispering... Someday they'll get it." - The Conclave

"Quantacat's name is still recognised even if he watches on with detached eyes like Peter Molyneux over a cube in 3D space, staring at it with tears in his eyes, softly whispering... Someday they'll get it." - The Conclave

I've been looking at 7790s and 650TI Boosts (stupidest name for a card EVER) and I'm in 2 minds atm

The 650Ti isn't much loved but prices are dropping - Scan did one under £90 delivered last week and at that price it's a much better buy than a 7770 IMO

The 650 TI Boost (impossible to Google as stock 650TIs often had a boost feature anyway) is a bit pricey atm but on paper looks like a nice card. Problem is they're all 2Gb models atm and £140+. You can still get a 1Gb 7850 for that money and that's in another SPORT, performance wise.

7790s are softer on price - there are some under £120 already and some of those come with Bioshock Infinite 'free' which is a nice bonus if you like it and £20 on eBay if you don't making the card just over £100

Whether they're better or worse than the 650 TI Boost depends on what you're playing it seems - early days for testing as we've not seen new drivers yet?

What I do like about both the 7790 and the 650TI (boost or not) is that they're shorter cards - I was all about to put a 7850 in this PC when I realised it wouldn't actually fit without me undoing all my sound-deadening changes (as it fouls 3 of the 4 HDD bays)

Hell I might even just get a cheap 650TI - I play some Physx games so it might just tip the scales and if it's under £90 I'll be happier again.

Where are we on the 1Gb vs 2Gb argument tho - most people reckon unless you're multi-monitor or >1920x1200 or playing Skyrim with the highest-def textures possible, 2Gb isn't really worth the money!?

The GTX 660 has a 7-inch PCB (~18 cm). If that's not short enough, your case sucks. I mean honestly, you can fit a GTX Titan in a mITX system, so you better be able to fit a GTX 660 or HD 7850 in a big old mATX or ATX machine.

My case is an ITX unit and it's just over 10" from the mobo edge/PCI bracket to the end of a 3.5" HDD. The bays themselves aren't really setup for long cards but even if they were moved over, HDDs would still foul the card.

Some 7850s are over 10" long (the dual fan cooler ones mostly) - quite a few land in the 9-10" range which would still be tricky (esp if their power connector is on the end) without writing-off at least 2 of the HDD bays

This is a very similar case - not identical but it shows the idea I think

HDDs will mount almost entirely inside the lower cage - only about .5" overlaps

You can see the right-hand motherboard screw mounts (9.6" whether ITX or Mini-ITX) and how close they are to the drives - with drives in there/cabled up, you need a card which is shorter than the board really.

There are 7850s which will fit in there but they've not been 'cheap' so far - as they're alledgedly killing-off the 1Gb 7850 they may yet get cheap tho!

I'd change the case only I've spent EONS mounting the HDDs quietly and I don't want to start faffing around with that again.

I just re-measured the case out of curiousity - bracket to HDD cage is just under 260mm - HDD not only sticks-out of cage but slightly overlaps motherboard (by the thickness of the SATA power plug) so max card length (allowing for power-connector at end of card) would be 210mm and most 7850s (even some 7790/650 Ti Boosts!) exceed that.

I'd have to remove all but the top HDD to clear that space I reckon - massive pain in the arse so I think I'll stick to a smaller card - likely a 7790 1Gb as the 2Gb models tend to run the bigger coolers

The first thing that goes if you want to put serious hardware in an HTPC: the drive cage. I have an internal water cooling kit and can fit in a 13" card if I wished, but only have space for a single dvd + two 3.5" HDDs (or dvd + two 3.5" HDDs + one SSD). I am content with having 2 HDDs in the case and additional eSATA external disk drives. 6TB of external storage running at the same speed as sata 3G, without the hassle of fitting a large gamer case in the living room or the added heat from additional HDDs ruining my overclock potential. Works for me.

I'll tell you what's weird about this thread - we've been talking for almost a whole page and Mashakos hasn't come-in with some amazing but only tangetially relevant concept whereby you can get a fusion reactor inside a matchbox if you just overclock it enough...